A Win-Win: Winning Twice

Ever since Zhuang Xiaolin had escaped the threat of death, the system customer service agent he had spoken to once never appeared again. Whether Zhuang Xiaolin called for it himself or searched through the system panel, he could not start a second conversation.

That customer service agent had vanished into thin air, Zhuang Xiaolin thought as he opened the search function on the system panel.

After entering the words "hip-hop song" into the search bar, he began browsing the enormous number of products.

All kinds of songs appeared before Zhuang Xiaolin. Some were high quality, some low quality, and their prices ranged from one point to a billion points.

After carefully weighing the pros and cons, Zhuang Xiaolin spent 50 points to purchase a rare-grade hip-hop song.

Including his previous expenses, Zhuang Xiaolin only had 210 points left. There were currently no other ways to earn points, making every single point especially valuable. But for the plan ahead, these 50 points had to be spent.

"Your name is Emperor, right? I heard you're a famous hip-hop singer. I have a hip-hop song I wrote myself. Would you be willing to give it an appraisal, Mr. Emperor?" Zhuang Xiaolin bent down and slung an arm around Emperor's shoulders, looking rather strange.

Emperor had originally intended to slap Zhuang Xiaolin's hand away, but the moment he heard the words "hip-hop song," his expression brightened as though by instinct.

Seeing this, Zhuang Xiaolin struck while the iron was hot and handed the sheet music over. Emperor did not disdain it and simply picked it up for a look. Although he did not know the person before him, his love for hip-hop music ran deep enough that he decided to examine the score.

"This... this is simply astonishing. It's not something an ordinary person could have written. Only a genius—no, a prodigy—could create something like this." Emperor's expression became increasingly animated, his initial look of amusement turning serious.

"Come! We'll talk in my office." Emperor shouted, then dragged Zhuang Xiaolin straight into the office and slammed the door shut with a bang.

"What's gotten into the boss?" Exusiai stared blankly at the tightly shut door.

"No idea. Maybe it's something important." Texas glanced around and spotted a bag of chocolate snacks.

She walked over and picked it up, immediately intrigued. Pulling one from the box, she placed it in her mouth and lightly licked it. It gave her a rather unusual feeling. The cloying sweetness was not as satisfying as smoking, but the sugar made her mind pleasantly sluggish, seemingly allowing her to temporarily forget some of her troubles.

Texas developed an interest in the snack. Turning over the box, she saw that it was a chocolate biscuit called Pocky.

Taking out her phone, Texas silently ordered several dozen boxes online. Given how she went through them back in Siracusa, even several dozen boxes might only last a month.

After a while, the office door opened with a click. Exusiai looked over curiously, only to see a scene that surprised her somewhat.

Zhuang Xiaolin and Emperor had their arms around each other's shoulders, chatting and laughing.

"A kindred spirit, a true kindred spirit! Brother Zhuang, I never expected you to be this talented. If you ever run into trouble, come find me. As long as you can provide more songs like this, I can pay a high price to buy them."

"You flatter me, Emperor. I merely stumbled upon it by chance."

"By your definition of stumbling upon it by chance, there wouldn't be any good music producers left in this world."

Zhuang Xiaolin tried to be modest, but Emperor saw right through him in a single remark.

"Relax, we're brothers. There's no need to be modest." As Emperor spoke, he pointed at Exusiai, who was looking at them from the side. "If you want to borrow my employees, go ahead. Just make sure they stay safe. That's my condition."

Exusiai:?

"Then it's a deal. I'll send you one song every month."

"Good, good, worthy of being Emperor's friend. Then I'll tell you something as well. It seems something has happened in Ursus, north of Lungmen. That city called Chernobog might undergo a major upheaval before long." That was all the intelligence Emperor revealed. Zhuang Xiaolin had not deliberately sought information in that area, so he merely nodded to show that he understood.

Why had Emperor's attitude changed so quickly?

It was all thanks to Zhuang Xiaolin's incredible gift for talking. As an old fox among old foxes, after exchanging just a few words with Emperor, Zhuang Xiaolin had more or less determined that Emperor was the type who only made "good" friends. So, in all likelihood, becoming friends with him was both extremely easy and extremely difficult.

But Zhuang Xiaolin had targeted Emperor's interests. After displaying some ability of his own and the special powers they talked about, Emperor had successfully been persuaded to make a friend.

After Zhuang Xiaolin promised to give Emperor the sheet music as a gift, Emperor proved equally straightforward. Since he had accepted Zhuang Xiaolin's gift, he would also help Zhuang Xiaolin with some things. For example, whenever Zhuang Xiaolin needed help, he could come to Penguin Logistics.

And so, without understanding what had happened, several Penguin Logistics employees were sold off by Emperor for the price of several dozen music scores.

Of course, that was a matter for the future.

Zhuang Xiaolin had won big—and won twice. He had only hoped to make friends with one of Lungmen's local powerhouses, but Emperor had turned out to be so straightforward. Not only had he become Zhuang Xiaolin's friend, he was even willing to lend him his employees.

With nothing more than a hip-hop song score worth 50 points, he had managed to befriend a powerful local figure like Emperor.

For an ordinary person, even meeting Emperor of Penguin Logistics would require clearing who knew how many hurdles.

After finishing his conversation with Emperor, Zhuang Xiaolin said goodbye to Exusiai and Texas, then left Penguin Logistics' base in downtown Lungmen.

He returned to the pharmacy in the slums. By then, the cash register was stuffed full of Lungmen Dollars, both bills and loose change.

Zhuang Xiaolin did not bother checking how much was inside. He scooped it all up and stuffed it into the system space.

After the system calculated it all, there were nearly 250,000 Lungmen Dollars in total. Zhuang Xiaolin was not particularly surprised. Although one bottle of basic healing potion only sold for 200 Lungmen Dollars, and its effects were not that impressive, it could make up for that with sheer quantity.

Zhuang Xiaolin had specifically investigated how Lungmen Dollars differed from the RMB of his previous life.

After careful research, he discovered that 1,000 Lungmen Dollars were roughly equivalent to 100 RMB from his previous life. The denomination was indeed somewhat similar to Japanese yen.

It would still take time to accumulate the 3 billion Lungmen Dollars required by the system. Even the purchase arrangement Wei Yenwu had promised would only settle once per month. Even if he earned 100 million Lungmen Dollars a month, it would still take at least thirty months.

Zhuang Xiaolin needed to increase his medical income through other means as well. He immediately dismissed the option of raising the price of the basic potions. Selling them at high prices was certainly a quick way to complete the mission.

But this was not his previous life. There were no exploitative, heartless capitalist bosses, no endless rules and restrictions, and the potions themselves were free. Zhuang Xiaolin suddenly felt like offering some aid to the poor people nearby.

It was not because Zhuang Xiaolin's kindness had suddenly overflowed. Rather, several things he had experienced in his previous life awakened his conscience at this moment...